"I watched them dance... I wondered if there would ever be a man in my life. Would a man see beyond my body? Would I ever be needed by a man emotionally or would I always be regarded as a burden for someone to take care of?" Malini Chib in her autobiographical book One Little Finger (SAGE).
Chib suffers from cerebral palsy that makes body movement and speech extremely difficult. But her cry of loneliness as her 'able- bodied' friends enjoy a party and dance with their male partners is not a lone one. There are many women who are passed by where sexuality is concerned. In fact, it is almost an unspoken, unuttered word. True, Chib has surmounted her disability, is a double M.A., holds a job, uses a communicator or voice-box much like the one physicist Stephen Hawkins does. She is also a rights activist for disabled persons. But it has been an uphill task for an intelligent mind trapped in a body, which needs help to move around.
Chib gives a moving account of her growing up years, the fantastic support from her parents, relatives and friends, using her one little finger for this 50,000 words book. Her book is full of positive vibes though there are ample examples of difficulties she has faced to be mobile, especially in India. But, as her brother Nikhil said, she revealed at the launch of the book at the recent Apeejay Kolkata Literary Festival, he also asked her why she did not talk much about her moments of pain and tribulations too, which she faced nonetheless in her growing up years till she became a confident young woman.
But Chib does give way to her inner trauma occasionally. Her need for love from the opposite sex and the sadness at disappointments appear in pages towards the end of the book. As she said, at the Kolkata launch of her book, "People think us as 'asexual.' As if we 'cannot' or do not have these feelings, something any so-called normal woman can have."
This small little observation brings to notice something seldom talked about in our society or families with disabled women.
Ranjita Biswas/ TWF